Research Questions

Safety Protocols
Potash Alum MSDS.pdf


Table of Contents

Research Questions
2015.11.16, 10:00am
2015.11.23, 12:00 pm
2015.11.23, 1:20pm
2015.11.28, 12:00 pm
Lost secrets of flemish paintings
2015.11.30,** **11:00 am
2015.11.30, 1:40 pm
2015.12.1, 10:00 am
2015.12.2, 11:15 am
2015.12.14; 10:20 am
Name: Marilyn Bowen
Date and Time:

2015.11.16, 10:00am

Location:Columbia University
Subject: Materials


Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and Time:

2015.11.23, 12:00 pm

Location: Columbia University
Subject: Preparing the Safety Protocol

We were working on preparing our safety protocol, which made us look back at our recipes to determine exactly which steps we would follow. In doing so, we noticed an interesting omission in the procedure: there is no indication of where the taffeta is used.
10v and 42v don't specify at which point the taffeta enters into the procedure. It is rather unclear if the taffeta should be soaked with the glue, or if the layer of batture should be applied to the taffeta afterward.
32r mentions a layer of batture, just like 10v. and says:
"Scribes</pro> and mediocre <pro>painters</pro> make <m>“batture”</m>, which is <m>joiner’s glue</m> tempered in <m>water</m> over the fire, somewhat clear, mixed with very little <m>honey</m>, that is a few drops to make it thicken, and then they use it to draw letters or whatever they want to <m>gild</m> with a brush, and immediately after lay down the <m>gold</m>, but the work they do is never quite neat, and if there is a lot of <m>honey</m> it dries only with great difficulty. This layer will be damaged in the rain. </ab>"

This passage mirrors the description of batture in 10v, and seems to answer our question: batture is a glue that's soaked in water (which tell us it's not our taffeta which is soaked in water) until it's someone clear (which tells us that this is to dilute the glue) and mixed with honey to thicken (this will help us when determining how much honey to add to our own mixture.

So our plan now is to make the batture by soaking the glue with water, boiling it, adding some honey, and then adding this layer (probably by painting) onto the taffeta.

Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and Time:

2015.11.23, 1:20pm

Location:Columbia University
Subject: Making Alum Water

We began by measuring 100 mL of tap water (the recipe on 73r, from which we were working, says alum and river water, but we made the decision to use tap water). We came up with this ratio by searching the solubility of potash alum, where we discovered that 36.8g to 100mL of water at 50deg.C is the appropriate ratio.
Then we measured 36.8g of potash alum.
We turned the hotplate on to low heat (1), placed the beaker with water on, and added the potash.
addingalum.jpg
1:24pm The mixture is starting to boil with bubbles forming from the bottom. It is at 34 degrees C.


1:30 The alum has dissolved. We turned off the heat.
Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and Time:

2015.11.28, 12:00 pm

Location: Columbia University
Subject: Research on Taffeta

Lost secrets of flemish paintings

p.162 Ms.p.17 Strongly desiccating oil that is like a varnish without body (taffeta)

p.164 Making canvass, calico, tafeta water tight
You need to prepare the cloth with fish or leather scrap glue, mixed with a bit of starch forstrengthening. Heat it with a little honey and apply this mixture to your fabric. Let it dry and then coat it with oil with lead monoxide. […] When I wondered whether the honey would dry, he answered yes, because painters who make flags and emblems for the purposes of war use it as well out of fear that the taffeta, coated with glue to avoid the pulling of the colors applied with oil paint, will become brittle and show cracks and creases.

p.182 mouth glue
p.243 a cheese glue A glue that glues everything
p.245 glue of beluga bladderAnother useful glue
p.256 for temper paintinghttps:drive.google.com/drive/u/1/folders/0B5F23-phxAz3Q3NPc3BWLS1VdTA
Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and Time:

2015.11.30, 11:00 am

Location: Columbia University
Subject: Making Amidin (Wheat Starch Paste)

11:00 We began to make the amidin (amydon/wheat starch paste) according to the protocol presented in Sanderson, Katherine. "Making it Stick: Paste on Paper" The Book and Paper Group Annual// 26 (2007) 155-159
We measured 30 g of Kremer's Wheat Starch Powder and 100mL of tap water and combined it in a 250mL beaker.
11:10 We left the powder and water to soak for 1 hr.
12:00 pm We began to heat 150 mL of water in two small 100mL beakers over low heat on a hot plate
12:10 pm We moved the wheat starch soaked in water to a hot plate on low heat. The mixture had separated, with a thick white mixture settled on the bottom and the water resting on top. As we began to stir, the substance at the bottome was very thick, but after using a bit of force in mixing, the substance combined with the water and became easier to stir. The mixture is opaque, and looks like milk
12:20pm We slowly added the hot water while still stirring. The mixture became very thick, slightly more transparent and resembles white glue.
12:45 Finished stirring. Removed from heat
1448905794412-294974628.jpg
Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and Time

2015.11.30, 1:40 pm

Location: Columbia University
Subject: 2nd Annotation Prep

1:40 Our alum water, which we had prepared last week, had solidified, turning the alum into chucks like ice cubes in the liquid, so we have put it in a large beaker over low heat to dissolve the cubes.
We have cut our taffeta (100% silk) into small squares.
1:53 THe alum water has dissolved and we have labelled 4 squares of taffeta.
1: 25 ml of alum water, 25 ml of wheat starch paste, 1ml honey
2. 25ml of wheat starch paste, 40 ml of alum water, 1ml honey
3: 25ml of wheat starch paste, 10ml of alum water, 1ml honey
4: 25 ml of wheat starch paste, 0 ml of alum water, 1ml honey

The recipe specified a few drops of honey, so we went with 1ml.
The manuscript did not specify how to apply the layer, so we chose pallette knives.

1:More like water, the amidin did not saturate the alum water, there are some slight chunks. Kind of looks like the gesso, but a bit thinner.The color of the mixture is an off-white, rather opaque mixture, with small white chunks (likely from the amidin). The taffeta soaks up the mixture fairly well, but it doesn't leak through (the reverse side has a few dark spots, but is otherwise dry)
2: Slightly more liquid-y than 1, still with chunks of amidin, but looks very similar in color to 1. The mixture goes on easily, spreads well and only leaks through in spots.
3: Much thicker than 1 or 2. The pallette knife kind of sticks to the fabric when applying. The mixture has no chunks, it is smooth to apply. Can be applied much more evenly.
4: Extremely viscous. No liquid quality at all. Spreads very evenly but VERY sticky. The pallette knife comes up with the fabric regularly. Though it spreads very evenly it doesn't smooth out--there is evidence of the different brush strokes.
Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and Time:

2015.12.1, 10:00 am

Location: COlumbia University
Subject: Annotation 2 Prep and Glue making

10:00 The taffeta squares dried overnight.
1: The surface has white streaks, with powdery, crystalline specks in the creases (they do not come off the fabric if you brush it). The edges of the sheet have come up a bit (if they weren't accidentally glued down) The crystals look like the potash alum.
2: SImilar to 1 there is a residue in the creases, although unlike 1 there are no streaks.The crystals look like the potash alum. The edges have curled up significantly more.
3: There is no residue and no streaks. 1 corner has curled up completely. Stayed fairly flat otherwise.
4. Curled over the most. No residue. The surface is much more bumpy.

10:24 We take our mixture of rabbit skin glue ground and water (which has been soaking since yesterday) and place it over a low heat in order to fully dissolve the crystals.
10:52 We removed it from the heat, all particles dissolved. The mixture is a light yellow.
We also cut parchment into strips to make parchment (or mouth) glue
10:55 We decide to test the rabbit skin glue by separating in into 2: one will be diluted with water (as per the manuscript's instructions) and one will be left as it is.
For the diluted batch, we separate 100mL of glue, to be placed with 500mL of water. We arrived at this ratio by looking at Marjolijn Bol's recipe, where she uses a ratio of 1:10 rsg to water. Our initial ratio for making the glue was more water-y than hers, so we shifted our ratio accordingly.
After adding the glue to the water, the water is very lightly colored.
11:00 We added honey to our blue mixture to make the batture
1: 25mL rsg to 1mL honey
2:25mL rsg to 2mL honey

We put them on a low heat to boil.
11:15 For the parchment glue, the recipe calls for the scraps to be "whipped" or batu, so we put the scraps in a mortar and pounded it with the pestle for a few minutes.
We measured the scraps, and we have 6.28g of parchment.

11:27 We removed the glue/honey from the heat

11:30 We put the batture on taffeta
1: More even to apply than the amidin alum water mix (no particles!) Smooth. The thickness is like very thin honey--
2:Fairly liquid-y, but easy to apply. It spreads easiley though it is slightly stickey (the pallete knife brings the taffeta up with it if lifted). Soaks through the taffeta.
11:40 We put the parchment scraps in a small dish and covered them with enough grain alcohol to cover them (about 45mL)
11:50 1 (1mL of honey) is still wet, while 2 (2mL of honey) is mainly dry
A particular recipe said that the honey slowed down the drying process, but the one with more honey has dried faster.
12:00pm We made apigment using cold pressed linseed oil and madder lake (made in the lab, Fall 2015 Sample D)
We pained a line vertically and diagonally on each square. We didn't have a lot of oil paint, so we were not encouraged by the prospect (it didn't seem like there would be enough to drip)
As we drew the lines, we on noticed 1.2 and 2.2 the colors were darker. Then we noticed around the edges of the lines, the oil spread further, leaving a dark shadow around the line, while these did not appear on 3.2 and 4.2. After a moment shadows appeared around 3.2, but not as noticeably as 1.2 and 2.2. The control had large shadows.
1.1 and 2.1 had no oil marks.

The alum water seems to make the color darker, but it also tends to make the oil separate more severely. However, the control square (with nothing on it at all) also had large oil marks, so something is needed on the taffeta.
Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and TIme

2015.12.2, 11:15 am

Location: Columbia University
Subject: GLue Making Part II

11:15: Our parchment scraps, which have been soaking oversnight, are placed ona hotplate over a low heat. Since we used alcohol with such a high percentage of alcohol per volume (~95%) when the manuscript likely used something less strong (like a brandy, ~40%) we added 10 ml of water, to dilute the alcohol a bit and this also then covered the scraps completely. The liquid then got a little murky.

OUr rsg which had been soaking in water overnight is now a light, off-white, slightly murky color. The consistency is also a bit more viscous--now where near as thick as our amidin paste, but still more glue-like than water.

11:25: We measured out two more glue honey batture mixtures
3.1: 25 ml of rsg in water, 1 ml honey
4.1: 25ml of rsg in water, 2ml honey

Our parchment scraps, which are being gently boiled, have gotten thicker and softer, though the recipe calls for them to be melted.
We painted the batture on the taffeta squares:

3.1: It feels like liquid. I put fingers on the taffeta after applying and it is not sticky at all. It is very wet. To make a comparison experiment, I apply batture on the other side of taffeta for the middle stripe to see if we will have different effects for preventing oil running.
4.1 The same

11:44 After gently boiling for a while, the liquid has reduce by about half, so we added about 50ml of water which quickly became murky.

11:55 For our parchment glue, we decide to split what we have in 2. (What we have is a milky looking liquid and thick parchment scraps that look very much like the animal skin they are. The consistency of the liquid is very much just water.) We leave the parchment scraps in because we're not sure if they're still necessary (the recipe said to melt them but they just got thicker and more rubbery)
1: Half of the glue and scraps left to sit on its own
2: Half of the glue and scraps left to soak in 5 time the amount of water

Half of the glue/liquid was 30 ml


Name: Marilyn Bowen and Tianhe Lou
Date and Time:

2015.12.14; 10:20 am


Location: Columbia University
Subject: Final batture and painting

10:20: We took our parchment glue (one of which was 30ml of glue in 150 ml of water [hereafter referred to as colle forte] the other was 30ml of glue) and put them on a low heat. It has been 12 days since we made the glue and the colle forte glue (the glue soaked in water) gave off a strong odor, so we heated it on a hot plate in a fume hood. We heated it until it was gently boiled.

The glue that had not been soaked in water had congealed a bit during the waiting period, and the parchment scraps (which we left in) were very thick. The glue which had been soaked in water was pretty much just a water-y mixture, though the color was a little murky and there were slightly gritty particles in the liquid.

10:25: The glue (which had been congealed) liquified and boiled fairly quickly, leaving us with again a very water mixture with no evident viscosity. The parchment scraps stayed thick and rubbery.

The colle forte is still on the heat, not yet boiling, but it too shows no signs of viscosity.

10:35: We cut 3 new taffeta squares. We

5.1: 25 ml of colle forte (30ml parchment glue soaked in 150 ml of water), 1ml of honey
6.1 25 ml of colle forte (30ml parchment glue soaked in 150ml of water), 5ml of honey
7.1 20ml of parchment glue, 1 ml of honey

For 6.1, we decided to use much more honey than we have previously to see if it actually makes a difference in softening the fabric.
Note on softening: in the manuscript it mentions honey to "soften" the tafetta, which didn't make a lot of sense to us at first, but we found on painting the layer on the taffeta, that the fabric gets rather stiff and crinkled, so this might be what the author-practioner is seeking to remedy

10:45 We separated the parchment glue from the scraps and ended up with just 20 ml of glue, while we had put 30 ml in the beaker. So the other 10ml may have evaporated when we boiled it, or been soaked up by the scraps
5.1 and 6.1 had little white particles in them.
We added the honey to our glues and boiled them again.

11:05 We painted the layers on the squares
5.1 Very liquidy. Not sticky at all. Soaked through the taffeta and did not spread easily
6.1 Much thicker than 5.1, spread much more easily. Soaked through quite a bit.
7.1 Had a slight bit of viscosity when the palette knife went in, but after a bit of mixing that went away and it was very difficult to spread. The surface was slightly sticky, and the layer went through the taffeta in a couple sticky spots.

12:30 We painted a stripe vertically and diagonally on 3.1, 4.1, 5.1, 6.1, 7.1
We used madder lake pigment (From Sample D, made in Fall 2015 in the lab) mixed with Cold Pressed Linseed oil.

We then decided to paint a stripe in Linseed stand oil (which is thicker) to see if that made a difference with the paint. We decided to pick only a few of our previous samples to try this on. In looking at our previous samples we noticed that the oil had spread on most of them, but that it took a few weeks for it to visible. This suggests that there is a long term effect to the efficacy, but that maybe that wasn't important. This may support the idea of this as an ephemeral product--if you only need the oil not to run for a short amount of time it doesn't matter if the final product doesn't look as good weeks later.

12:45 We decided to paint on samples with 1ml of honey (for consistency) and the control
Control Nothing
1.1 25ml rsg, 1ml honey
3.1 25ml rsg in water (1:5 ratio), 1 ml honey
5.1 25ml parchment glue soaked in water (30ml to 150ml), 1ml honey
7.1 20ml parchment glue, 1 ml honey
3.2 25ml amidin, 10ml alum water, 1 ml honey
ASPECTS TO KEEP IN MIND WHEN MAKING FIELD NOTES